


Tumblr shortfics

by anthean



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-09-13 15:04:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16894833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anthean/pseuds/anthean
Summary: don't mind me, just archiving snippets from tumblr





	1. Les Amis merfolk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> from a tumblr request meme

“Well, Grantaire,” said Enjolras, hair swirling around her face like the spines of a startled lionfish, “I shall consent to try you; you shall go to the Grand Rhône Canyon.”

Grantaire fluoresced the chromatophores lining her torso and tail, finally settling into a deep scarlet wash. “Red,” she said, gazing at Enjolras intently. Then, “Be easy,” she whispered in Enjolras’ ear, before vanishing with a flick of her tail into the dark of the Méditerranée.


	2. Urban fantasy Boromir

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> various snippets of a bizarre urban fantasy-ish AU, focusing on Boromir

Boromir finds Faramir on the tower roof, his feet hanging over the edge, staring southeast over the floodplain: Star City, Tower of the Moon, and beyond them— well, no one in the South liked to name it, even in their thoughts.

“Barad-Dur,” Faramir says in the old tongue, just to prove Boromir wrong. Boromir sits beside Faramir and dangles his feet. Below them, the gloaming city is full of nervous light.

“He doesn’t mean it,” Boromir says eventually.

“Yes, he does,” Faramir replies. He fingers his left wrist, where, under his sleeve, is tied a bracelet of braided black hair. _He’s not my real father_ , he doesn’t say, but he doesn’t have to.

“Okay, he does,” Boromir says. He nudges Faramir with his shoulder, and then, when Faramir doesn’t respond, sneaks an arm behind Faramir and puts him in a headlock. Faramir shouts and swears and fights, and they wrestle for a moment on the roof’s edge, the city bright below them and the horizon lost in smudgy shadow.

Faramir finally shakes him off. _I’m going to find Rivendell_ , Boromir thinks.

“It’s gonna take you a while,” Faramir says, and doesn’t smile.

* * *

 

“My son,” Denethor says, opening his arms and walking forward. His shirt clings and drapes oddly on his torso, evidence of the bullet-proof vest he wears underneath at all times, even in his sleep. When Boromir embraces his father the ridges of the vest are stiff and strange under his fingers. Denethor tugs at the collar of Boromir’s brown leather jacket, tightens the buckle one more notch. “You are strong and canny, and you will return with glory for Gondor,” he says, and steps back, smiling faintly. “My true firstborn.”

Faramir steps forward too quickly, shouldering between Boromir and his father, and Denethor frowns. “Never mind glory,” Faramir mutters. With one finger he sketches the White Tree sigil over Boromir’s heart. “ _Home again_ ,” he says in the old language, and Denethor frowns again, deeper. “And keep texting, as long as there’s a signal. The defense at Star City will be difficult, without you.”

“Faramir will certainly miss your military skill,” Denethor says, eyes cold.

“Certainly,” Faramir says, and his voice is light, but Boromir knows better.

“I will come back,” Boromir says. He hears the phantom hiss of static, the words _Isildur’s Bane_ near buried in white noise. “I will.”

* * *

 

“Excuse me,” Boromir says, nearly crashing into a businesswoman in a slick blue suit. “Sorry, I just need to—sorry.” He ducks and weaves around a horde of commuters, all headed for the Southbound White Mountain and Gladden lines. He’s headed upstream, and he only just manages to leap onto the “up” escalator without knocking anyone over.  
  
The top platform is quieter this time of day, and Boromir raises his face to the large skylights and pauses for a moment. It’s not as good as being outside, especially not after fifteen days underground, riding the lines up from the Isen/Old South Hub, but it’s something. He’d hoped to take his motorbike all the way from Tower Watch, but she’d spun out from under him just as he was crossing the River Isen, choked and died and wouldn’t live again despite all Boromir’s mechanic skills and all the clumsy spells of engine-spark-oil-hum- _combust_ he’d whispered to her as they’d lain together by the side of the road in the dark.  
  
” _u cant take iron up north dumbass every1 knows that_ “ Faramir had said after Boromir texted him, frantic.  
  
” _how do they have cities then? and what am i supposed to do now?_ ” Boromir had replied.  
  
” _valley line_ “ was all Faramir said, as though that was supposed to help, and ” _ur phone wont work either_ ”. Everyone was pretty sure Faramir was a changeling, though. He’d always been better at magic than Boromir; maybe it made sense to him.  
  
Boromir had said a few words over his bike, scratched one of the Rohirric “evermind” sigils in the dust beside her, and bought a ticket for the Eriador Main lines. He’d transferred at Hollin, spending twelve hours alone on a platform lit by a single flickering fluorescent light, waiting for a train he wasn’t sure would come, while loud bangs and creaks and, once, a scream echoed from the tunnels at each end of the platform. There were no stairs to ground level, only a single closed door, and when Boromir put his ear against it he heard lapping water. From Hollin he’d ridden the Wilderland/Barrows line until it divided at the Arnor hub, and now here he was, looking for a train that didn’t appear on any map.  
  
There’s one of the linesfolk stretched out on a nearby bench, her head propped on a backpack, watching him. Boromir has heard of these people, living in the underground, keeping it safe for the passengers, but he’d assumed he’d never meet one. His father said they didn’t exist, that the only thing that kept you safe on the lines was yourself, but Faramir seemed sure of their reality, and Boromir was long in the habit of trusting his brother when it came to fey matters.  
  
“You’re staring, Gondor,” says the lineskeeper. She has a tattooed star on her throat, eight-pointed like a compass, and it ripples when she speaks. Her hair is snow white, and little wrinkles crease her temples and under her eyes.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Boromir says. “I didn’t expect to meet one of your people. I’ve been on the lines for a while, and never seen any of you.”  
  
“We mostly keep to the Northern lines and hubs,” she says. “There’s bad magic on all the lines, but up here’s where it all flows out from. You’ll pardon me for saying, but you Southern folk got no idea what we deal with living in the tunnels up here.”  
  
Blood rushes to Boromir’s cheeks. “You think it’s easy, living near the Black Land? Seeing your people, your family, enthralled, dreaming of the Tower of the Moon each night? Does that sound like fun to you?” A few people turn to stare; Boromir glares at them, and they move away down the platform.  
  
The lineskeeper is still lounging on her bench. “No,” she says. “My people are from the South. We’ve ridden your lines, walked your streets. You can take care of yourself. But the folk up North…You’ve been to Hollin Station.” Boromir doesn’t ask how she knows. The platform is bright, the tunnels dark and old, the walls of the trains so thin. There are things that move in the deep places. “We won’t let that happen here.”  
  
Boromir nods. He feels reassured, safe, like he’s just met someone he knew a long time ago, forgotten when he was still a child. “I’m looking for the Valley line,” he says, the words he hasn’t told any other traveller for fear of the attention they’d bring.  
  
The lineskeeper swings her legs to the floor and sits up. “Are you,” she says. “You looked on a map?”  
  
“It’s not there, nowhere I’ve looked,” Boromir says. “My brother said _Isildur’s Bane._ ”  
  
"You won’t find it,” says the lineskeeper. She stands up, walks towards him. “Go stand by the tracks, Gondor, and face me.”  
  
Boromir does. The tunnel wind blows at his back, and out of the corner of his eye he sees a light in the South tunnel, small and distant but growing larger fast. He begins to turn his head, and “No! Don’t look,” shouts the lineskeeper. The rumble and clatter of the approaching train grows louder and louder on Boromir’s left side. The platform is empty now except for the two of them. He keeps his eyes fixed on her face, watches her white hair swirl around her head in the growing wind.  
  
“Next train,” whispers the lineskeeper, clear somehow above the roar, and the train slams into the station, the shockwave of air pushed before it almost knocking Boromir over.  
  
“My name’s Gil,” says the lineskeeper as the train glides to a stop. The doors swish open behind Boromir. “Tell my son hello when you see him.”  
  
Boromir steps backwards into the train; the doors close in front of him and the train begins moving again, Gil’s hair a streak of white on the platform before the dark of the tunnel. The train seats are scratchy blue polyester and the underground map on the wall is exactly the same as every other map Boromir has seen, except for the addition of a green line reading “Valley” running North-South parallel to Hithaeglir. There are no stations.  
  
He doesn’t know how long he sits on the train. He’s exhausted and hungry and craving the sun, but he can’t sleep, can’t even shut his eyes, can only watch the lights on the tunnel walls flash by, illuminating the word “VALLEY - - - VALLEY - - - VALLEY”.  
  
After a while, the door between cars opens and a man walks through, and Boromir is so tired that it doesn’t seem surprising at all. The man walks down the car and folds himself into the seat facing Boromir. He looks a little translucent, like only part of him exists in the real world, like Faramir had looked for a few months when he was a baby.  
  
“Boromir Denethorion,” the man says, and his voice is the rattle of the tracks and the rasp of branches in the wind. “I’m El, although _which_ El will have to wait until later. You’ve found the Valley line. Come.” And he draws Boromir to his feet and leads him to the train door.  
  
"There are no stops,” Boromir says.  
  
“Just one,” El says, and heaves the sliding doors open. The dark brick wall rushes past a few inches from their faces, terrifyingly solid. “Hold on. _Aiya Elbereth!_ ” he cries and, yanking Boromir along by the arm, leaps off the train straight at the wall.  
  
The world is so bright for a moment that Boromir is blinded. When his eyes clear, the first thing he sees is El’s face, somehow more solid now, more real, and behind him—the sky. He loses a few seconds staring before he notices El laughing at him. They’re standing on a path above a narrow pine-filled valley. At the western end, under a setting sun, cooking smoke rises from a large, friendly, house, its windows bright with firelight.  
  
“Welcome,” says El, “to Rivendell.”


	3. Bahorel gets a cat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so Tumblr User afamiliardog and I had this extensive AU wherein all the members of Les Amis worked at an animal shelter. Bahorel had a tiny overwound mutt named Wselfwulf (don't ask) and an incredibly chill tabby named Kitty. This is the story of Kitty.

Bahorel is waiting when Feuilly arrives at the Musain County Animal Shelter, late for work. He’d been up late prepping a room for a new foster cat and her kittens the night before, and then Grantaire had called early the next morning to report that a new stray had begun showing up in his backyard. “She’s real skinny, but I think she might be pregnant,” he’d said on the phone while Feuilly tried to eat yogurt and tie his shoes at the same time. “I don’t fucking know, though, you’re the one who cares about cats, you come deal with it.”  
  
“Dealing with it” had meant two hours crouched in Grantaire’s overgrown backyard, dew slowly soaking through his shoes and the knees of his jeans, coaxing the cat closer while R drank beer and talked to himself on the porch. The cat had been happy to be caught, once she’d decided that she was more hungry than scared. He’d packed her in a carrier—and she was definitely pregnant—and driven her to the shelter, waving off Cosette’s lecture about “sleeping, Feuilly, _sleeping_ ” and leaving the cat with the vets in the back. He’d then gone in search of Bahorel, finding him standing near the cat cages, a mid-size gray tabby cradled belly-up in his arms.  
  
“Who’s that?” Feuilly asks.  
  
“Brought her in a few weeks ago,” Bahorel says. He rubs a few circles on the cat’s stomach. She blinks at him. “She belonged to a hoarder.”  
  
“Seriously? That’s the calmest cat I’ve ever seen.” Usually animals rescued from hoarders are nervous and aggressive, too used to having to fight for food and space. This cat is perfectly relaxed, belly exposed, paws flexing slowly on Bahorel’s forearm.  
  
“I think she knows she could beat me up if she wanted,” Bahorel says. “I respect that.” He bends his head towards the cat; she reaches up a paw and gently taps his cheek.  
  
“You going to adopt her?” asks Feuilly, careful to keep the smile out of his voice.  
  
Bahorel straightens up. “Nah, man, what if she and Wselfwulf didn’t get along?” referring to his tiny overwound mutt, who was, Feuilly reflected, certainly not capable of hurting a cat but definitely capable of bugging the _crap_ out of one.  
  
“I don’t know,” Feuilly says. “If she could take you in a fight, she could definitely take your puppy.”  
  
Bahorel skritches the cat under the chin. “Me’n Wselfwulf, we’re the dream team, we do good by ourselves. Besides, she’s the chillest cat ever, she’s gonna get adopted in like thirty seconds.”  
  
“Whatever you say, dude. I have to go brief Combeferre on this stray I just brought in. You ok back here?”  
  
Bahorel nods and waves him off, eyes back on the cat snuggled in his arms. Before he turns away, Feuilly sees her paws start working again, and hears the beginning of a jackhammer purr.  
  
Talking to Combeferre, first about the stray and then about the new litter of kittens he’ll be bringing home later, takes the better part of an hour. When he comes back, Bahorel is gone, and so is the cat.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Heart of Winter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16931067) by [13th_blackbird](https://archiveofourown.org/users/13th_blackbird/pseuds/13th_blackbird)




End file.
